Pyrce High
"A school, a murder and a killer, can you survive the round?" —''Pyrce High hub teaser'' Pyrce High, (official pronounciation unknown), is a game built and played with the BYOND user-creation software. The game is played in a single-round format, and is based on the idea that, in each round, there is a murder and a killer. It incorporates aspects of various anime and manga, as shown directly in the different selectable modes, and more subtly in some of the game's items. History Beginnings The beginnings of Pyrce High can be found by looking at Mitadake High, an earlier BYOND game with similar gameplay and themes. Due to the rapid shrinking of the playerbase and the ultimate abandonment of it's creator, Mitadake High started it's journey down the road of scrapped games. That was when a user by the name of MasterBraska decided to create Pyrce High, despite not having permission from the creator of Mitadake High. He then proceeded to recode the game from scratch and add in new modes and content. Although the game uses many icons and a similar interface from the previous game, it is presumably to keep the feel of the original Mitadake High. Toward the start, the game had several more modes than the previous three of it's predecessor, including suspect mode, which declared one of the players as the killer through the school's computer announcement system. Whether or not they were actually the killer was up to the other players to find out, and the accusation was not always true. Another was Judgement mode, wherein one player had godlike powers, and could use them to manipulate and kill the others. The early version of Witch Mode at this time had the player chosen as the Witch play as Beatrice. Bernkastel was toggleable by the host, and Battler, Ronove, and Eva Beatrice were spawnable by the admins. From it's launch, Pyrce High was met with slight cynicism from veterans of Mitadake High, but was quickly joined by many of the previous game's players. Catching the eye of many as a more active community, the playerbase expanded rapidly, eclipsing Mitadake with it's fresh approach and progressive admins. The attention it drew came with a price, however, as the staff of BYOND also took notice of the game, and, after deeming it a 'fangame', due primarily to the inclusion of it's Death Note mode, removed it from the main site's listings. Middle to Late-Middle 2013 Continuing strongly despite the disapproval of the BYOND team, Pyrce High kept on pursuing updates and advancing the game's features. An RP Chatbox was added to the game, a useful box that appears on screen and displays in-character text alongside a player's hair color. Additionally, partially in response to the game's removal from the listings, a new mode termed 'Artist Mode' was developed to replace Death Note mode. This idea was given up on, however, and instead the mode was inserted in game seperately on it's own. During this period the staff of the game consisted of the owner, MasterBraska and three admins, Nii-Nii Satoshi, MetaFrosty and Kooler221. A new global moderator was sought out at the time, and Wolfshock was chosen for the position. Even though Wolfshock possessed a sense of responsibility, a hard-work mentality and a large degree of popularity within the playerbase, he unfortunately quit later after a short period, with the consensus being that he had worked himself too hard. At the end of this time Slender mode, a mode based on the popular Internet meme, the idea of which was inspired by one of the former main host's (BYOND user Barney Stinson 69) "custom rounds," was added to the game, along with an update to Vampire mode. Late 2013 / Kyogirl4lyfe Controversy After only a few weeks, this mode and two other modes, namely Judgement and Artist, were later removed completely. Shortly thereafter, Nii-Nii Satoshi and MetaFrosty were removed from their staff positions and replaced. Kyogirl4lyfe was rehired as an admin and Puckaboo2 and Nozu were added as global moderators. Following Kyogirl's reinstatement, many problems arose between her and certain other players, mainly Sarah54321. This, joined with several other incidents, led into the Kyogirl4lyfe Controversy, which effectively divided the community between those who supported Braska's decision and those who sided with Sarah, along with a few players who cited other alleged wrongs that caused their dissent. The event ended with the apology of Braska and the subsequent reconciliation of both sides. The game has continued on to this point, remaining as a strong, independent example of creative role-playing on the Internet, gaining new players almost daily. December 2013 / Pigbearman VS Nozu Controversy Pigbearman, a notorious troll that joined since the beginning of the High games, dating back to the beginning of Mitadake, had managed to irritate admin Nozu to the point of creating a PSA asking all admins to ban him from their servers. Pigbearman was playing the game with friends FalconPwnch, Tockz, and KidaMasaomi, when FalconPwnch was RKed (Randomly killed). Pigbearman reacted by trying to defend his friend saying that the people who RKed FalconPwnch should be banned. However, the admins and hosts wouldnt respond and ignored Pigbearman's request, leading him to flip out and begin making racist comments resulting in a ban. Later, he joined NightSparrowMystia's server, immediately making racist memes out of user Marshmallow and her sister. Shortly after the PSA was created, and Pigbearman presumably switched account or quit the game. Post 2013 After the controversies, the game slowly started to die, along with Braska being accused more of stealing Mitadake's sources and the original creator of Mitadake coming back. Eventually the playerbase died down enough to where Braska took down the game from Byond. After fans protested enough, MasterBraska announced that the game is coming back after he revamps the coding for the game. However, there has been no update since October 2015. Gameplay Interface The game uses the built-in BYOND interface system, which is based around verb commands. On the right side of the screen the statistics and all available buttons are sorted into tabs for ease-of-use. To the left is the main screen, which shows the actual game to the player. Below that there are slots for players to place certain items, allowing them to quickly equip or use them later without having to use their tabs. At the bottom of the screen is the text-input bar, which is how players write and post text to interact with others in the game. More recently the HP and Stamina bars, which were previously just above the slots, were moved to the top-left corner. There are three tabs, seperated into Statistics, Inventory, and Commands. The Statistics tab shows relevant data regarding your player character, including your Alias Name, which you choose at customization, another, random name called Real Name, which the game gives you automatically each round, how much health and stamina you have left, and the current condition of your character. The Inventory tab contains all of the items you have obtained or received throughout the game. There is an unmodifiable twenty-pound weight limit to your Inventory, and when it is surpassed your character's speed is slowed down dramatically. Items such as pencils, papers and spraypaint add little to your weight, whereas large weapons such as axes and billhooks can take up a lot of space, forcing players to be cautious about what they pick up. The last tab, Commands, does what it says on the tin, displaying all of the verb commands selectable to the player. Commands like push and search, along with others like commit suicide and whisper, can be chosen and used from a simple list. Roleplaying The main focus of Pyrce High is on the creation and enjoyment of creative writing. Players, heavily relying on the text-input feature, type out what their characters say and do with the Say, Shout, Whisper and Emote commands. Combined with the interactive sprite-based aspect of the game, players can establish and contribute to intricate roleplaying experiences and stories together within the setting of the round. As Pyrce High uses modes to determine the round's situation from the start, players must work within the framework of the mode's world during their roleplay. The benefit to this is that it swiftly gets the round rolling, as each round, indifferent to the mode, begins with the death of a teacher, and an announcement that the school is on lockdown. Before a round starts players are able to modifiy their characters by changing their gender, hair style, hair color, and name. They are also able to write character profiles that other players can read during the round. Category:Pyrce High Category:BYOND